Mytheos

If you were to add something like this, I would focus on the concept of both having different benefits and not end up with a better best situation. It should be a supplemental mechanic. Giving up a site would give you a small funding bonus based on UFO size. Result = Players give up sites they cant otherwise do, extra sites that would have rotted otherwise OR they skip missions they dont feel like doing. Players can choose to send a Chinook to a site they give up, which gives them a slightly larger funding boost, and the soldiers sent on the mission would receive experience. Result = Players do as many missions as they can, and then create a secondary team they use to "Train" new squads of soldiers on assisted missions. The cost of setting up a secondary team is high as it is, and then finding a good way to gain them experience normally results in negative experiences for the player. Rookies = Greater risk to your Veterans that are babysitting them, and leveling 1-2 at a time for redundancy creates a situation of...well I need them to replace losses, but I wouldnt have taken a loss had I brought all veterans. And by the time the missions start to grind a bit, is around the time you could use a secondary team, and outfitting and training them adds to the grind by slowing down and complicating missions. (Not to mention increases the chance of deaths doing something for the primary purpose of creating replacements for lost soldiers) Therefore use the extra sites to train rookies, it gives the player a safe way to train rookies, and doesnt slow down their game due to having to train up rookies manually, and allows greater redundancy...which can mitigate a more dangerous balance of the game. Lets face it, people want challenging missions where risk of death is all around them, and they want to take deaths so this risk seems real....and they want to beat every mission without loosing a soldier. XCOM handled this conflicting desire by giving you an excess # of soldiers per mission, and made it so you WOULD take losses...which created the "Scout Fodder" tactic. The problem was that having that many soldiers really slowed down the gameplay. But games since have lowered/GREATLY lowered the number of soldiers and therefore had to decrease the risk of death (make the game easier)...which again risk of death is a key concept of the game...and leads to save/loading because you just CANT afford to loose that soldier...making risk of death pointless. With this new concept you could keep the risk of death but allow players to mitigate losses better. Instead of I lost two soldiers, so now I have rookies going on missions which causes the player to have an increased risk of loosing more, starting a downward spiral OR the I'm bring rookies to train them up to replace losses, which caused me to take losses I wouldnt have had if I had brought all my Veterans. Summary: In order to reduce the number of missions a player does, give them the ability to turn over the rights to a crash site to a funding nation, for Points and allow then to send soldiers to assist, which essentially just gives them experience. ("Auto-Trains" them with low or no risk of death) Therefore it isnt a situation of better/best so much, and a player isnt penalized for doing or not doing every mission. *In reality it'd still be better to send 8 rookies with ballistic weapons on a mission against a lightly damaged Cruiser vs sending them to assist...but taking that option is asking for a failed mission unless you are a Master Level player...and even they probably would want to mess with that situation. You could even have the assisting carry a risk of death, higher the rank the lower the chance of the soldier dieing...but deaths should be low anyways. (If a rookie dies...so what? The ones that live can be used as replacements as they level up)

The night missions are harder, and are meant to be so. Its a concept of risk, and theme. If you deal with a greater risk, you get a reward...more money etc. Over the course of a few months depending on your luck avoiding night missions can impact your progress a decent bit. Instead of avoiding them, I suggest you save/load them until you are able to handle them better, it will require better and perhaps new tactics...and those tactics can be applied to day missions to make you a better player. Once you get the hang of it, they arent really that big of a deal.

Just a side note, but I honestly believe you could take smoke grenades out of the game and only 10-20 people would notice. Seriously. I cant even understand how you can even play this game without using smoke grenades, obviously its just me and 10 other people but.../shrug

@ Josip Broz Tito I think we're getting off subject, I wasnt talking about the AI or saying it should be suicidal. Obviously it shouldnt, short of Androns and Reapers perhaps. But there is NO benefit to being suppressed (In game), other than you might duck, which really isnt going to help you much. Suppression is assumed to be the Alien being "Pinned Down" unable to react, fire or move because it feels if it does it will be at grave risk of injury or death. Therefore you would assume the Aliens would have higher bravery than your average human, as well as a MUCH higher tolerance to pain. Especially higher ranked ones, and specific types. So again from a reality and game mechanic standpoint...and again this is the only statement I am qualifying... "Being hit a Single time should not Auto-Suppress Aliens" However being hit would logically cause more suppression damage than the bullets that count for suppression but dont hit their target. Now that is out of the way...Human Wave Attacks, thats a bit of an off example, due to the nature of being pumped full of cocaine...it might reduce pain but it doesnt keep you cool/focused or calm...the opposite really. But the Africans need 12-20 years to create a troop, the Aliens could only need a few days/weeks/months maybe? So depending on how many troops you have and how expendable/replaceable they are has a lot to do with it. But anyway you look at it suppression = no return fire and defenseless. Which is bad. In the game they dont run to cover or retreat...they just stand where they are and crouch. Its more like going into shock than being suppressed really. So making every time you shoot an Alien = Suppressed = Easy Mode

I could quote myself, but I agreed that you should take more suppression for being hit vs being missed. But I disagree with 1 hit suppression, which would make the whole game rate up there with "My Little Pony: Princess Tea Party" in difficulty.

Yeah but again we are not talking about normal situations, we're talking about a helicopter landing and 8 troops running out. Not trench warfare. Either way feeling you were shot and feeling crippling pain are two different things. Pain = Bad for combat situations, which again is why your body turns it nearly off when you are in a fight or flight situation, its more effective... YES you do take more damage, however more damage is preferable to death due to crippling pain. I mean imagine two boxers, one with pain one without. Who has a longer career, the one with pain. Who wins the fight all other things being equal, the one without. Granted it might be his first and last fight, but when you can punch so hard you break 5 bones in your hand, and continue to pummel the crap out of your opponent unphased...any way you look at it, it's an advantage. *Cough* Disposable Soldiers *Cough*

In war pain isnt useful for disposable soldiers. Yes all lifeforms have pain, because we arent disposable it's needed. However we have adrenaline too...which nullifies pain... Thats why you get in a wrestling match and feel fine, but quickly afterwards you start to notice the damage you took...if you felt it at the time it would be detrimental, causing you to loose a fight MUCH more often than it caused you to win it. Hell recently a UFC fighter broke his big toe in a majorly screwed up way (The youtube video makes me cringe) and went on to win the fight, he didnt even notice until he was having his arm held up to show he was the winner. If he HAD felt it, he would have lost that fight for sure. Again the Aliens dont really care if they take losses...therefore the positives of feeling pain are vastly reduced, and not feeling pain would be better. I mean just imagine an army of humans with no fear and no pain...they would mess stuff up..MUCH higher casualty rate but MUCH higher kill rate too. And again, disposable soldiers = who cares about losses...the Aliens could loose 100 soldiers and it'd be worth it if they could take out 1 of your 8 Commanders/Colonels.

Fearless means you dont let fear guide your actions, and when you do it's never a good thing. It doesnt mean you have no concept of fear and dont have the ability to understand this is a good choice this isnt. But being shot in the shoulder and dropping your gun and then holding your arm, as you fall to your knees crying isnt as effective as shrugging off the shot and keeping presence of mind enough to return fire, and kill the guy that shot you. Dont get me wrong I am NOT saying fearless = Not using cover and just marching towards the enemy like a terminator. I am just saying that if I had a clone army I would want it to be smart and tactical as well as fearless and have a reduced sense of pain. In fact you could remove pain all together as it would serve no purpose. Therefore in general being shot should increase the amount of suppression more than having a shot miss, granted. But in no way can I think from a reality or sound game mechanic function that 1 hit suppression makes any sense...for the Aliens anyways.

This

I love smoke grenades. Let me say that again, I LOVE smoke grenades. However with the recent changes I think they feel a bit too gimmicky and granted I havent had a bunch of time to test them, it seems like you could REALLY exploit them now. Previously they seemed to work by reducing per tile the Alien's Accuracy...and if it was low enough they simply wouldnt fire at you. This however required 1-2 smoke grenades and being at long range. If you tried to use a smoke to protect yourself in close range it didnt work too well...you needed distance (Reduces accuracy) and a bunch of smoke tiles between you and the Alien (further reduced accuracy). The only problem with them was that they didnt do anything to reaction shots. The new ones block Line of Sight (LOS) and thus reaction shots, and maybe it was dumb luck but I was able to have the door open in a small scout and all of my soldiers in that tiny room with 2 Caesans and spent 2-3 turns without being shot at or reaction fire being used. It seems to create a situation of you "know" where the Aliens are and you can just force fire at that tile and it seems to be effective at killing them, although accuracy suffers. I assume this is designed around allowing you to use them to create a safer close ranged combat environment. Personally I think having an accuracy modifier per tile, and a reaction fire modifier per tile would be better though. So if you kept your distance and used 1-2 depending on the Alien's Stats/type you could greatly reduce the Alien's accuracy and their reflex skill so they would have a much smaller chance to reaction fire. However they WOULD still take shots, but they couldnt hit the broad side of a barn through smoke, and they COULD take a reaction shot, but their reflex skill would be greatly penalized making it occur much less often...not to mention their accuracy with said reaction shot would be diminished. Being 2 tiles away and not being shot at just seems a little cheesy and ripe for exploitation, there ARE pros and cons for both versions but... I still have to play test them some more (Been busy the last two weeks, and didnt try 19-7 because they were bugged) so for me the jury is still out. What are your thoughts so far with 19 SC?

The simple truth is fear slows you down, makes you loose focus, makes you waste actions, and puts you on the defensive. Not to get started on a bad topic, but for a lot of the Jihad type soldiers, their religion tells them that if they die they go to heaven with 72 virgins or whatever. Which makes them not afraid of death...and its a fact that suicide bombers are incredibly effective normally being around a 1 to 30 kill ratio. So using religion to make your soldiers more brave and more fearless wasnt an accident, I assure you it was done entirely on purpose. And if it wasnt effective they wouldnt be doing it.

Was just an example, we dont clone soldiers so each one is more valuable as well as their experience. However in this game as a specific example, does being suppressed help the Aliens? No. They duck if they can when suppressed which makes them harder to hit, but by them not taking reaction shots it allows us as the player to run up and pet them if we want. Which not shooting someone in the face when they run into melee with you because you are scared doesnt make much sense. Look at the old XCOM. Did your squad function better when everyone lost their Shi& and started firering off randomly, dropping their weapons and running away or ducking and cowering in fear? Of course not. When your soldiers get suppressed now do you feel that aids them or hurts them? Obviously it is a penalty. So I would counter, if you had a nearly inexhaustible supply of clones, yes being fearless does make them a good soldier.

Well I think the main reason is self preservation and fear of death/pain. Just like the storm troopers in the new movies, they were all clones and fear was removed from them, and there were several scenes where they were waist deep in combat with bullets flying all over the place, and they didnt even seem slightly phased. I would imagine what they were created for would have a big difference on suppression, like a NonCom or support type would need a higher sense of self preservation where as an Elite/Warrior/Soldier would be created with the idea that... "They Shall Known No Fear" (please dont sue me GamesWorkshop)

The idea is how you use close combat AFTER suppression, as using it before is suicide. Think of this situation, you're outside a Corvette or whatever, there are Aliens inside. (This is general tactics not Master level) Every time you open the door and toss a grenade or take shots, you suffer the risk of reaction shots, so if you end the turn with the Alien not dead, you are safe if you stay outside (Assuming the alien inside is suppressed)...however you have to start the process over again and once more risk reaction shots. So after suppression if you run a guy in to point blank it and kill it, you end up leaving one guy inside, which exposes him to risk from any Aliens in the back room, if they happen to open the door and walk out into the first room. If you dont manage to kill the Alien after running in because you missed too many time or got screwed on variable damage...or both. Then that soldier is promised a face full of hot plasma. It isnt intuitive to run in close and not have increased accuracy and a more positive damage range...it just makes sense that you would have a better chance to hit the Alien and to hit him in a good spot. So if you have to say...I need to win 2 of 3 rolls to hit and the Alien dies, and I'll save myself having to go through another round of reaction fire by being more conservative. Now however you have to win the same 2 of 3 hit rolls, but now also have to win 2 Variable damage rolls. Anyone with an IQ over peanut butter can tell you its harder to gauge the risk now and harder to win 4 rolls than 2. So you are at greater risk of not killing the Alien, and then being killed after you click end turn, which is almost a promised death vs everyone staying outside and closing the door which is almost a guaranteed no one dies on the Alien turn. Why do people instinctively run in and try to shoot a suppressed Alien? Why do you "want" to get close? Because from real life they know it's easier to hit a target you shoot at the closer you are, and you have a greater chance of hitting a critical point on the target. If you asked someone do you think you have a better chance to shoot someone in the head at 100 feet or 5 feet, the answer is obvious. If you told them, the chance to shoot someone in the leg three times is the same at long range or close range and asked does that seem normal, they would say no. At max range you aim at the general chest area, and just try to hit your target, at 5 feet away you can aim at a specific button on his shirt and probably 90 times out of 100 hit within a couple inches of it. So running up to someone and shooting them for the less than base damage just seems bizarre...should it happen? Yes. Should it happen multiple times in a row...maybe extremely rarely. Should it have a roughly equal chance vs shooting them for above base damage? No.

That really has nothing to do with any of my thoughts...I really wish I could figure out what angle you are viewing this from. And 1 hit auto suppression would be terrible.

Yeah but horribly wrong doesnt have nearly the same chance as goes normally...you know in real life. (Thats why it went horribly wrong, because the chances are 90% everything goes ok, and that 10% chance that something critically bad happens.) Like I dont miss 3 times in a row and then blow off a finger with a shotgun point blank as often as I take 2 shots and put one in the head one in the chest...those being nearly equal just doesnt make sense...and nothing you can say can change that FACT.

I guess I am out of examples. I really cant think of another way to say, when presented with a set of circumstances a player decides yes I'll do this, or no I wont. They think about the 2-3 shots, the fact that they could hit for 30, 60 or 90...not the fact that over 1,000 shots I'll average 60. I mean seriously, do you guys run out from cover to shoot an Alien 2 times and leave him hanging because you had a 55% chance to hit instead of taking 1 shot and then running back behind a wall just because out of 100 times, 55 of them you wont die? Btw variable damage is behind the chance of hitting, so you dont ever KNOW you are going to finish off an Alien.

Again all for variable damage, just like it to be more consistent at close range. Big picture means nothing when you are deciding is this move worth it. No one says well maybe they die this time, but 7 out of 10 times they will live, so its ok, I'll continue to use this strat. They say well I'm not going to use that tactic or weapon because inevitably I'll get burned. Do you guys really not care if you loose 1 soldier every 10 missions or 3 soldiers every 10 missions?

Or another example if you dont have a good impression of baseball... I hand you a 6 sided die, and say roll a 3+ and I give you a million dollars...roll a 1 or 2 and I shoot you in the face with a shotgun. Why dont you want to roll the die? I mean over a 100 or 1,000 times rolling it, you have a 66% chance of winning a million dollars. Because you "arent" rolling it 100 times, you're just rolling it once. In the same respect you arent shooting a gun 3 tiles away 100 times, you are only dealing with a couple rolls. (Edited because I thought I said 2+ lol)

@GizmoGomez I keep hearing over a 100 shots its average. But please realize that doesnt mean a whole lot. This game is like baseball, you have games and you have missions, you have seasons and you have entire playthroughs. If a player has a .250 batting average they hit 1 out of 4 times...on average. But this doesnt mean anything when they are on a 0 for 14 slump over 4-5 games, or when they are on a hot streak batting .650 over the last 6 games. And if your perception of the shotgun is that it sucks, you stop using it. So if your sample is from 10-12 shots taken you arent going to reach the 100 shot average mark before you decide it's worthless. Either way, tactics are based on chances, and if your risk isnt consistent then people are going to shy away from anything but strong statistical advantages. Which is fine, but I feel people should get more consistently expected results from things that have a higher risk, when dealing with life and death. And close combat is more risky now, because getting a string of bad luck at long range means a longer battle, a bad streak of luck at close range means dead soldiers. I have heard several comments already saying that close combat is way more dangerous than before and people are avoiding it where as before they enjoyed it. If they could count on it more, they would do it more...and in reality getting closer with a weapon means you CAN count on it more, where as now in game you actually can count on it less. I mean variable damage by definition isnt consistent, again at least over the 3-5 shots that decide a life or death.

I am sure this is just a situation of it being worked on, the AI that is. They AI probably just cant take advantage of it as well as they'd like atm. There is no one that is going to say Aliens being in buildings and taking tactical advantage of them is a bad idea...unless they think that would make the game too hard or something. Also we know Chris wants C4 to be more useable, and taking down a building with a couple of Aliens entrenched in it seems like something that would be crazy for them not to want as it would expand C4 viability greatly.

Umm... I was pointing out that if an Alien had say 75 HP, and you shot it with a 80 damage weapon, there was a 100% chance of killing it. Now if you roll a 75-120 you kill it, if you roll a 40-74 you dont. But I am saying if the base damage is enough to kill it, rolling better than that means nothing, therefore there is a chance of not killing it, whereas before there wasnt. Yes if you couldnt 1 shot it before now maybe you can, doesnt average when the majority of enemies you see through the game are usually lower ranked ones.

Well it makes sense people use more ammo now, as many battles are going to require more shots to win. If you can 1 shot an Alien with base damage, which becomes common when using Plasma vs lesser ranked Aliens, then all you need is base damage. Getting a good roll on base damage +1 or +1,000 doesnt make a bit of difference in those cases (Which are often). However getting lower than base will make you need to take more shots. This is where the law of averages fail to come out balanced. Simple fact vs the previous build you are going to use more shots to kill something on average than before in many cases.

I am for variable damage, and if it stays as is, better than nothing, even tho that positive comes with some negative if not balanced. Making it stat based doesnt really cover the "point blank you shouldnt be hitting the guy in the foot 3 times as often as you put 3 in his head situation" If and of itself its an interesting idea, but it doesnt solve it being more intuitive to have more damaging shots happen more often at closer range vs long range.

Honestly it is too early to have this conversation in any matter other than sharing 1st experiences and talking theoretics. It needs a little time being tested before anyone would make a change. But as it stands, the pellets on the shotgun should be great to help balance them, and this replicates a random damage system effected by range, two thumbs up to the Devs for putting in the time for this. However for all other weapons, there is little reason to ever want to get closer. Sure you get a slightly better accuracy bonus, but you have to spend TUs to move, and take takes away from shot #, which more bullets = more cover destruction and Suppression. So even at a statistical disadvantage you still are better off just putting more bullets on the target in many cases. Having a system that rewards getting close with both positive effects on random damage and accuracy, creates an interesting tension, and helps to buff close combat. Tactics are a major reason why shotguns are hard to balance. You can either take all your shots 1st and then send in the shotgunner, which often just kills the target, so you feel like you never send them in much and it would probably be better if they just had a rifle or Machine gun. Or you send them in 1st and if they dont kill the Alien, you tend to have problems taking shots to finish it off without risking shooting them. So before you knew the damage to expect, and you got it. You just had to win the hit rolls. Now you have to win the damage rolls and the hit rolls, and over 10 missions sure it'd average, but you put yourself at a much greater risk from many different elements...and dead soldiers = bad. Its risk vs reward, and the risk is great and the reward isnt generally worth it. Variable damage nerfs close combat more than it helps, you just need to have more expected results if you want to run the risk, and now they are more varied.